


Into the Rot

by salamandelbrot



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Cults, Gen, Kayfabe Compliant, Worship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-19 04:25:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5953495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/salamandelbrot/pseuds/salamandelbrot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And for the sake of our family you wear a sheep's clothing over your monster's skin and, with Me as your shepherd, we walk through the pestilential valley of this earth together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Into the Rot

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fingalsanteater](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fingalsanteater/gifts).



There were times when Bray had to walk the decaying world. At these times Luke would follow by his side. He used to be afraid every time that he'd lose himself again, and he'd hover at Bray's heels like a puppy in a thunderstorm. Now he was an old dog, unafraid so long as his master was near. He understood that, standing within Bray's circle of light, within that fire that burned away the rot of the world, all its sickness could not touch him. 

It had been easiest to fight. When they went forth to do battle with the corruption of the lost it was only natural, their mosterousness a moral duty that followed from Bray's teachings. And when Bray looked on in pride while he forced a man to the canvas, it made Luke's heart soar to know he had done right by his savior.

Accompanying Bray on his sermons, in the parking lots and the malls, was another kind of battle. But not one he could help with, and that made it hard. It was a lesson he learned anew every time, to accept Bray's love and be carried by his words. It humbled him, made his hands yearn to reach out and touch his brother, to lay a hand on the back of his neck the way Bray would to Luke after a match well fought. Luke would be gentle, if he did, and even in his imagining his hands shook. But he did better and kept his hands limp at his sides, drinking in Bray's glory with only his eyes.

What had scared Luke the most, before his faith had grown beyond fear, was those trips of Bray's to serve the flesh of his family. Holding a plastic basket while the savior's hands reached out to a shelf of beans. The first time he'd seen Bray's skin touch a barcode had been during a sermon back at the compound, as he tore the thing to shreds and threw it into the bonfire. The second had been at this very conviencence store, plucking a tin of peaches from a wall of the same and placing it in the basket Luke carried. The feel of each item added to the basket, tying him to this material earth, used to unnerve Luke. But it was the only contact Bray paid him in this place and he came to relish it, each worldly weight a wound he accepted in Bray's name. And, later, in the car, Bray would preach a sermon just for him, reaffirming their abomination for this sick, old world. And Luke word hear the words behind his words and in the arm pulling him to lean towards his brother, full of praise for his obedience, and it would be good.


End file.
